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Early Life

McConnell was born in Tuscumbia, Alabama to Julia Shockley and Addison Mitchell McConnell and raised in south Louisville, Kentucky, he attended duPont Manual High School and graduated from the University of Louisville College of Arts and Sciences with honors in 1964, where he was student body president and member of Phi Kappa Tau. He graduated in 1967 from the University of Kentucky College of Law, where he was elected president of the Student Bar Association. McConnell gained experience on Capitol Hill as an intern under Senator John Sherman Cooper, later as an assistant to Senator Marlow Cook, and was a Deputy Assistant Attorney General under President Gerald R. Ford.

U.S. Senate

McConnell was elected to the Senate in 1984 when he defeated two-term Democratic Senator Dee Huddleston. Since then he has been reelected four times. After the 2006 elections, he was unanimously elected Senate Minority Leader, previously serving as Majority Whip. He is married to former Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao. McConnell has been very involved in Republican party politics. He was chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee during the 1998 and 2000 election cycles. In both, Republicans maintained control of the Senate. McConnell is viewed as a conservative on nearly all issues, receiving an 89% lifetime rating from the American Conservative Union. [1] However, he was one of just three Senate Republicans who voted against a Constitutional ban on flag desecration. [2]

McConnell offered offshore oil drilling resolutions on the Senate floor in July 2008. He was intent on setting a trigger to initiate drilling if the price exceeds a certain mark. First he offered to drill if gas prices hit $4.50 a gallon. This was rejected by Democrats. Then he offered a trigger at $5.50 a gallon, $7.50 a gallon and $10 per gallon, with Democrats rejecting each offer.[3]

Mitch McConnell managed to hold onto his senate seat in the 2008 elections, which saw a Democratic surge, just short of a supermajority. Mitch McConnell is widely regarded within the Republican Party as an adept Minority Leader. The filibuster strategy used by the Democrats was first pushed by McConnell.